Women's Fitness Magazines

5252 Words11 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: How are beauty standards portrayed

Fitness Magazines

Women’s fitness magazines are supposed to inform females how to get fit and be healthy; however, they continuously send messages to women that they have to fit certain standards of flawless skin, sex appeal, and dangerously low amounts of body fat. Women in their twenties and thirties are feeling the pressure from society to conform to body images seen in magazines, such as Heidi Klum who is 5’9.5’’and 119lb, Carmen Kass who is 5’10.5’’ and 114lb, and Elsa Benitez who is 6’ and 125lb (Magazine Dimensions 153, 162) (supermodelguide.com). (Are these the healthy bodies that we should be trying to obtain?) Fitness Magazines need to revamp themselves and give women healthy, realistic images and informative articles so they can help women become healthy.

The Department of Medical Oncology at the University of Newcastle states in its online medical dictionary that health is “the state of being hale, sound, or whole, in body, mind, or soul; especially the state of being free from physical disease or pain.” Fitness is defined in the medical dictionary as one’s “well-being” or “A set of attributes, primarily respiratory and cardiovascular, relating to ability to perform tasks requiring expenditure of energy.” One’s cholesterol, body fat, blood pressure, endurance, etc. are all part of fitness and health. A healthy average daily cholesterol intake should be less than 300 milligrams (“Cholesterol” 1). The healthy range of body fat for women ages 18-39 is about 21 to 32 % (shapeup.org 1), and the healthy values for body mass index (BMI) are from 18.5 to 24.9 (“Obesity and Overweight” 1). The average blood pressure is 120/ 80 mm Hg (detecting-hypertension.com 1). These figures are what Americans should strive to obt...

... middle of paper ...

...ications Inc. 2000.

Schillinger, Dawn. “Boost Your Students’ Self-Esteem”. American Fitness Jan/Feb 2002. Vol. 20. Issue 1. 40- 44.

Shape November 2002. Ed. Barbara Harris. Weider Publications Inc., 2002.

Sherman, Alexa Joy. “The Ultimate Guide to AB Training.” Shape November 2002:84.

“Supermodelguide.com: Supermodels & Model-Actress Bios.” The Insider’s Guide to Supermodels and Modeling. 2002 <http://www.supermodelguide.com/supermodels/carmen.html.>. <http://www.supermodelguide.com/supermodels /elsa.html.>. <http://www.supermodelguide.com/supermodels/heidi.html.>.

“Well-being.” Dictionary.com 2000. The American Heritage Dictionary of English Language. <http://www.dictionary.com/search?q=wellbeing.>.

“Women in advertisements are getting younger, thinner, and more racially diverse.” Marketing to Women. June 2002. EMP Communications, 2002

Show More
Related

  • Sexism in The Work Place

    1273 Words  | 3 Pages

    Stephenson, T., Stover, W. J., & Villamor, M. (1997). Sell Me Some Prestige! The Portrayol of Women in Business-Related Ads. Journal of Popular Culture, 255-271.

    Read More

  • Changes of Women’s Roles in Advertising from 1900’s and 1920’s

    1300 Words  | 3 Pages

    Advertising, whether criticized or celebrated, is undeniably a strong force in American society. Portrayals and Images of women have long been used to sell in published advertisements. However, how they have been used has changed enormously throughout the decades. Women have fought to find a lasting and prominent position in their society. Only in the span of twenty years, between 1900’s and 1920’s, the roles of women changed dramatically here in United States.

    Read More

  • African American Women In Advertising Analysis

    712 Words  | 2 Pages

    The text at the bottom of the ad chosen reads, “The lighter way to enjoy chocolate. HERSHEYS.” The left side of the image depicts the back of a larger African American woman who is not wearing any clothes. On the right we see rippling heresy’s chocolate syrup. Hershey’s is trying to make a correlation between the colour/shape of the women on the left, and Hersey’s chocolate syrup on the right. Throughout this paper I will be taking a look at how women are affected by advertisements that promote dehumanization, body shaming, objectification, and the negative portrayal of African American women.

    Read More

  • Media And Eating Disorders Essay

    772 Words  | 2 Pages

    The photos seen in magazines of these models are also airbrushed and photo shopped before being printed. The body shapes of the models are unrealistic, unhealthy, and unobtainable for the average person. In addition to the models, magazines are also filled with advertisements. Most ads in magazines are directed towards beauty in some form. Again, these ads all show photographs of women with the unreachable “perfect body” that can cause multiple victims to feel insecure and unhappy about their body shape and weight.

    Read More

  • The Media's Influence on Body Image Disorders

    1487 Words  | 3 Pages

    Deanne Jade believes that the media does its part to keep us informed on "valuable information on health and well-being," (Jade 8). I agree however I feel that is done in such a manner that girl feel as if they must exhaust the media’s advice on fitness and health and use these methods in order to obtain the picture perfect body image that they see on TV and in magazines. A cou...

    Read More

  • Unrealistic Body Images

    1147 Words  | 3 Pages

    The most fashionable, sought after magazines in any local store are saturated with beautiful, thin women acting as a sexy ornament on the cover. Commercials on TV feature lean, tall women promoting unlimited things from new clothes to as simple as a toothbrush. The media presents an unrealistic body type for girls to look up to, not images we can relate to in everyday life. When walking around in the city, very few people look like the women in commercials, some thin, but nothing similar to the cat walk model. As often as we see these flawless images float across the TV screen or in magazines, it ...

    Read More

  • Reasons Why Women Develop a Negative Body Image

    1161 Words  | 3 Pages

    In modern society there is more and more digital editing without the knowledge of consumers. Currently there are various reasons for why women develop negative body image, low-self-esteem and eating disorders. According to Naomi Wolf in her novel “Beauty Myth”, one of the many reasons women obtain concerns with their bodies is due to the universal images of young female bodies presented through advertisements in fashion magazines. Advertisements in magazines are altering and shaping the desires of men and women. Magazines sell viewers images of beautiful, skinny, flawless confident young women. When people are constantly antagonized with the magazine industry’s ideal of “perfect beauty” the viewer’s then, subconsciously believe these images to be true and begin to form biases about what they themselves should look like and what other people must also look like. People who view magazines get mislead by advertisers because they are unaware that all the images displayed are digitally altered through Photoshop and airbrushing. Today’s magazines are formed completely on false ideals of flawless beauty and unattainable body images, to prevent women and men from falling victim to the magazine’s deceitful images we as a society need to become aware and educate ourselves.

    Read More

  • The Effect of Advertising on Women's Body Image

    1387 Words  | 3 Pages

    middle of paper ... ... “Three in four Americans (76 percent) say that a woman's appearance on the job is likely to affect whether she is taken seriously. Eighty-four percent of women and 68 percent of men agree with that statement”. To sum up, it is often said that advertising is shaping women gender identity, and some have argued that the statement is true, because of the higher amount of sexual references of women that advertisements show and the damage that occurs to women’s personality and the public negative opinions of those women.

    Read More

  • Analysis Of The Garnier Fructis Advertise

    939 Words  | 2 Pages

    Curry and Clarke’s article believe in a strategy called “visual literacy” which develops women and men’s roles in advertisements (1983: 365). Advertisements are considered a part of mass media and communications, which influence an audience and impact society as a whole. Audiences quickly begin to rely on messages sent through advertisements and can create ideologies of women and men. These messages not only are extremely persuasive, but they additionally are effective in product consumption in the media (Curry and Clarke 1983:

    Read More

  • The Depiction of Women in Fitness Magazines

    1107 Words  | 3 Pages

    Conventional women’s magazines including fitness magazines have traditionally fallen short of providing empowering images of women in articles and advertisements. In the 1980s, fitness magazines catering to females were launched for fitness oriented women (Hardin et al 105). Magazines that were targeted at women’s fitness were analyzed regarding how they portray women in not only articles but advertisements as well. Oxygen, Self and Shape are all fitness magazines that provide articles and images of women regarding fitness and health. All three mainly depicted Caucasian women as having the perfect body consisting of being fit, muscular and healthy. However, in achieving these characteristics the magazines are depicting these individuals as sexual objects making them wear minimal clothing and are proving unrealistic goals that are unattainable by majority of the women. According to Flegal et al the prevalence of obesity amongst women in 2007-2008 was 35.5% compared to men who were at 32.2% (235). This indicates that there is a need for women to become more active in order to sustain healthy weight maintenance, however in doing so they are portraying women in a more negative than positive manner. Women in fitness magazines are depicted as having a healthy weight and being the perfect individual but, their images in articles and advertisements are depicting them as being sexual objects mainly to the benefit of men.

    Read More

  • Representation Of Women In Fitness Magazines Essay

    1703 Words  | 4 Pages

    An investigation into the representation of women in Fitness magazines. With specific reference to Sports Illustrated Swimsuit issue, ESPN’s Body issue and SELF magazine. Representation is the way media texts portray a “real world by presenting reality in various ways.” In a way the audiences are manipulated to believe the synthetic ideologies and meanings from a reality purposely constructed to give a bias depiction. The focus of this investigation is to deconstruct the stereotypes around gender roles by analysing series of fitness magazines, looking at how gender identities are portrayed and how stereotypes are used in selling products.

    Read More

  • Romantic Comedies: Lack Of Stereotypes

    789 Words  | 2 Pages

    Because of the lack of diverse representation in major media, people make assumptions based solely on appearances and the depicted stereotypes. This directly results in an adverse effect on the consumer’s behavior. This lack of representation spreads across all types of media such as magazines, movies, television, and social media. While I am checking out at my local grocery store, in every checkout lane there is an array of magazines and advertising marketed towards women.

    Read More

  • Impact of Cosmetic Advertisements on Women

    1059 Words  | 3 Pages

    Estee Lauder’s beauty product is one such advertiser. In an August 2004 issue of Vogue magazine, enclosed was a two-page ad campaign intended to sell Estee Lauder’s “Future Perfect Anti-Wrinkle Radiance Moisturizers SPF.” This advertisment is appealing to the consumer because it stresses the importance of remaining young by the use of this product. This advertisement then goes further to stress that, “The past is forgiven, the present is improved, and the future will be perfect.” This advertisement includes three alluring models, all of which are of different ethnicity but essentially have the same physical attributes. This image is used to appeal to all sorts of American women. The models all have famished bodies; this includes their angular, somewhat gaunt faces and protruding collarbones. Located right below this image is the company’s slogan which reads, “ESTEE LAUDER. Defining Beauty.” The attempt is made with this advertisement to define beauty with images of starved and malnourished models which Estee Lauder claims to be the standard for beauty.

    Read More

  • Portrayal of Women's Sexuality in Media: A Race and Gender Analysis

    520 Words  | 2 Pages

    For example, Jackson and Ervin (1991) analyzed 962 advertisements in fashion and magazines and found that Black women were only 23 percent in advertisements. Women are not portrayed as positive role models in our media, instead as sexual objects and product users that will charm men. Weaknesses: In my opinion, the author analyzes and compares how gender and race play a role in our society.

    Read More

  • The Importance of Image in the Modern World

    693 Words  | 2 Pages

    Thus, the mass media promotes an ideal image of what a beautiful and desirable woman should look like, influencing women around the world to model after. An example is the Glamour magazine survey: 75% of women aged 18-35 were reported to feel that they were too fat; 45% of underweight women felt they were too fat; almost 50% o... ... middle of paper ... ... ay’s context is pursuing the best of everything. Desperate times that make image no longer important do not prevail in the modern day.

    Read More

More about Women's Fitness Magazines

Open Document